Matt Keogh (Burt, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Defence Industry) Share this | Hansard source

[by video link] The Morrison government's spin around their childcare announcement has been annihilated by new data. In July, data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics revealed 138,700 Australians aren't working because they can't access child care. Of those people, 92 per cent are women. Further, 113,000 Australians want employment but aren't actively looking, because they've given up on all job prospects. That's about 250,000 Australians. The Productivity Commission estimates that number is even higher—almost 300,000 people. Australia's expensive childcare costs are preventing parents—specifically, but not always, women—from working the hours they want and contributing to our economy.

This is also doing nothing for our gender pay gap. It's something the Prime Minister, a former treasurer at that, has only just realised actually exists. Perhaps that's why we have slipped from 15th in the World Economic Forum's Global Gender Gap Index in 2006 to a shameful 50th place on gender pay equity. The costs of child care are undeniably out of control, and the Morrison government's half-hearted policy before us today falls appallingly short of what's required to provide genuine relief for families. The policy before us in the Family Assistance Legislation Amendment (Child Care Subsidy) Bill 2021 will see a small amount of relief dished out to a small minority of families for a limited amount of time. That's good for them, and we don't oppose that. But the vast majority of families don't get additional support under this plan from the Morrison government, and they desperately need it. Our nation desperately needs it and it wants it.

New polling shows that three-quarters of Australians support a universal early education and care system. The Early Learning Monitor, a poll of almost 5,000 Australians on behalf of Thrive by Five, makes clear that the high cost of early learning and care is a barrier that parents want removed. And that's fair enough. Parents in Australia cop some of the highest out-of-pocket costs for early learning and care in the world. For many, they can't afford to work. More than half of parents with a child under school age say that having access to more affordable quality early learning and care would help their families and would reduce the career and family sacrifices they're required to make.

Australians are moving away from the outdated idea that early education and care is just an issue for women or that it's some form of middle-class welfare. Early education is an economic policy that will substantially impact our nation's economy and GDP overall for the better. The lack of affordable child care is holding back small businesses and our nation from the recovery that we all desperately need. We know that about 99 per cent of all Australian businesses are small and medium enterprises. We also know that 40 per cent of these businesses are owned and run by women.

The high cost of childcare fees has resulted in increasing withdrawals of children from care, which means less income for childcare centres, job losses for educators and career stagnation for many women. I met with a childcare centre in my community last week who revealed they've lost many children due to the unsustainability of childcare costs for their families—and they're one of the more affordable centres in our community. So many working parents, predominantly mothers, are being left with no choice but to reduce hours or give up on work to look after their children, regardless of their desire to continue working.

The pandemic has proven that child care is an essential service. Research tells us that increasing female workforce participation is one of the biggest economic opportunities for government and that cheaper child care for more workers can deliver it. Increasing the childcare subsidy can have a multibillion-dollar positive impact on our nation's GDP. Only this week, families across the country have been hit with bills from the federal government, calling on debts dating back to 2017 to be repaid. One resident from Sydney said she is claiming COVID 2019 disaster payments after losing most of her income through the pandemic. But with one hand they give and with the other the government are taking away. This mum summed it up when she told 9News:

I feel the system is flawed. Not only do we spend an extortionate amount on childcare, more than any other country, but this system that the government has put in place to supposedly help us and get mums back into the workforce, has got little loopholes where they can throw out random bills to us.

Hundreds of families have been hit by similar situations, with many of these debts arising from the childcare subsidy. One of my local constituents has been hit too, with no notice of such debt that arose over a year ago and was sent directly to debt collectors as well.

The ABS, independent research and Labor have all discovered the same thing: that the Morrison government's rhetoric around their childcare policy is nothing more than spin. Labor's policy proves unequivocally that our policy position provides more support for more families and for longer. Eighty-six per cent of all families with children under six already in the childcare system would be better off under Labor's child care policy rather than this one from the government. To break it down: every single family with one child aged five or under in child care—that's some 727,000 families—with a combined family income of less than $530,000 will receive absolutely no lift in their childcare subsidy under the Liberal government, but they will under Labor. The vast majority of families with a combined family income of between $69,806 and $174,806 with two kids in child care will be better off under Labor. That means that the vast majority of the community of Perth's south-eastern suburbs that I represent will be better off.

But the federal government, dangling that carrot for families, by supporting families with three kids in care at the same time, will assist just 1.8 per cent of all families. Meanwhile, Labor's childcare plan will leave a million families better off than they are right now—four times as many as the Liberals' plan. Our plan to support more families for a longer amount of time will result in a boost to GDP three times greater than that under this government. Both policies—the Liberal policy that is before us today and the policy federal Labor is committed to—are both due to kick off in July 2022. That, of course, is after the next election. So, it's up to the Australian people to decide: do you want a childcare system for which the government's own department of education predicts that costs to parents will increase by more than four per cent every year for the next four years? Or do you want a real plan to tackle the skyrocketing out-of-pocket childcare costs?

Australia's childcare system is fundamentally broken. The proposal before us today falls well short of what Australian families actually need. Labor has a plan to bring down the cost of child care and keep it down for 97 per cent of families. A federal Labor government will introduce cheaper child care for working families. That will see the scrapping of the $10,560-a-year childcare subsidy cap, which often sees women losing money for an extra day's work. It will lift the maximum childcare subsidy rate to 90 per cent, and it will increase childcare subsidy rates and taper them for every family that's earning less than $530,000 a year. Importantly, the ACCC will be charged with designing a price regulation mechanism to shed light on costs and fees in order to drive them down for good. Meanwhile, the Productivity Commission will also conduct a comprehensive review of the sector, with the aim of implementing a universal 90 per cent subsidy for all Australian families.

It's time we made child care more affordable and made it easier for Aussie families to get into—or back into—the workforce. It's good for our nation's economy, it's good for education, it's good for working families, it's good for their career progression and it's good for household budgets. It will help spearhead our nation's economic recovery from this pandemic. So, let's bring down childcare costs and make child care more accessible for all Australian families, with a real plan, not just what we see in the plan in this bill.

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